


The Thing He Loves

by cordeliadelayne



Category: Primeval
Genre: Forgiveness, Friendship, Getting Together, Introspection, M/M, Making Up
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-02-22 22:03:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23401102
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cordeliadelayne/pseuds/cordeliadelayne
Summary: Stephen must forge a new life for himself after Helen's reveal.
Relationships: Nick Cutter/Stephen Hart
Comments: 4
Kudos: 31





	The Thing He Loves

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Spikedluv](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Spikedluv/gifts).



> Written as a Christmas present for the lovely spikedluv who wanted Nick and Stephen making up after the Helen reveal in Series 1.

“Yet each man kills the thing he loves  
By each let this be heard  
Some do it with a bitter look  
Some with a flattering word  
The coward does it with a kiss  
The brave man with a sword”  
Oscar Wilde, The Ballad of Reading Gaol

“Of all the things I thought of you,” Cutter said, voice like his body wavering slightly, “I never thought you were a coward.”

Stephen wanted to say something, anything, but the lump in his throat wouldn't let him. And besides, Cutter wasn't wrong.

* * * * *

**Six months later**

Stephen marked off six months since he left the ARC on his Save the Whales calendar and took a final sip of his tea. It had taken him a long time to get there, where he could mark off the time and not feel a deep hole open up inside his chest. Now it was just a general ache whenever he thought about the life he'd had, the life he'd royally fucked up.

He wasn't quite sure what had possessed him to decide to finish his PhD, not with every line of his previous dissertation covered in Helen's fingerprints, but the Open University had been more accommodating than he'd expected and even if he didn't want a life in academia he did want a sense of accomplishment again, and right now this was the only way he was going to get it.

He stared down at the printed document, running his hands over the cover. Done and proofread and poked and prodded, it was ready for the final step. And still he hesitated. His supervisors had assured him that there was nothing more to be added, it was as good as it was going to be. And yet.

He laid it down and went to make another cup of tea. He'd hand it in when he finished this he promised himself and turned on the TV. At first he couldn't quite make out what he was seeing but even he couldn't mistake the outline of a sabretooth when it's stalking through a graveyard.

The reporter was spouting some nonsense about an escaped zoo animal in the foreground but Stephen was more interested in the background, where an unmistakable tuft of messy hair was berating a young policeman standing guard outside the entrance to Highgate Cemetery. Finally Stephen caught sight of Jenny doing her own stalking towards the reporter, and the scene suddenly changed back to the studio.

He knew that the team didn't need his help. But he still kept checking his phone in case anyone rang, and trawled the internet for any news he could find but Jenny had been as efficient as usual and there was no sign of anything amiss anywhere, not even on Connor's favourite conspiracy sites.

* * * *

Two days later, when his PhD was in the hands of a bunch of fusty academics and there was nothing else he could do about it, he found himself going for a jog around Highgate. It was massively out of his way and he'd not be able to adequately explain himself to any of the team if he bumped into them, but he wanted to have a look at the scene for himself anyway.

The Cemetery entrance had a sign on it saying that tours were temporarily suspended and to check the website. Police tape was still littering the ground but no one seemed to be about and peering through the gates he couldn't see any signs of damage, or evidence of bloodshed. Nothing in fact to show that a creature, an anomaly, or his old team have ever been there.

It wasn't as comforting as he'd thought it would be.

* * * * *

Helen showed up one day in September, when the air was turning cooler and her outfit was even more inappropriate than usual. She had a limp and a long scratch along one arm and Stephen had to clench his fists to stop himself from punching her.

“Don't be like that, darling,” she said. “I just want some help and then I'll be out of your hair.”

He told her to piss off and then left her alone in his flat while he called the ARC. They sent some security team he'd never met before who changed the locks for him and installed a camera at the front door.

They didn't mention Cutter and he didn't ask.

* * * * *

The next time he saw her she was running towards an anomaly that had opened in Hyde Park. He'd been minding his own business this time, running for hours so that he could get some sleep at night even if it meant pushing himself to beyond exhaustion when he'd heard what at first he'd thought was a stampede coming from the nearby concert, until he'd realised that it was a very different stampede all together.

They came at him so quickly he'd had to roll out of their way and it was only when they were upside down that he could identify them as Maiasaura.

He called it into the ARC but they were already on their way and he was advised to remove himself from the site. They didn't exactly threaten him with arrest but he got the idea. He settled for watching from over the road as the team arrived, straining to catch a glimpse of anyone familiar. He counted them all in and counted them all out, but Cutter hadn't been one of them.

* * * * *

The job search wasn't going well, though Lester had provided a surprisingly florid reference. The problem was many of his skills were only really relevant to overseas work and he wasn't sure quite yet that he wanted to leave the UK. It felt too much like a permanent running away, instead of what he'd been privately calling a personal retreat.

But maybe he was just kidding himself. Running away, retreat, it was all the same in the end. The people he'd turned his back on didn't care what he called it.

He settled in the end for a job serving coffee at his local Pret a Manger. The staff assumed that he was a model just earning pennies till his big break came and he didn't feel the need to disabuse them of the notion. He had enough money saved up that he could survive for a few years on a minimum wage job until he put together a better plan. Or any plan at all.

* * * * *

The job wasn't exactly taxing but his colleagues were friendly and the customers not too demanding and it felt good to be contributing in some small way to the local community. They hosted quiz nights on a Wednesday evening and fed the homeless on a Thursday and a Sunday, with a local book club taking over most of the building on a Tuesday. They were also close enough to a tube station that regular commuters would pop in and he enjoyed surprising them with their favourite orders before they'd finished asking for them.

It wasn't until the day Cutter walked in that he started to have doubts about his decision to work there. He was on his own, the other two staff on duty dealing with a problem with the ovens out back and he felt horribly exposed just standing there behind the cash register.

Cutter didn't approach him straight away. Instead he selected a sandwich, a cake and a drink before placing them on the counter before Stephen.

“I'll have these to go, please.”

Stephen found his voice had left him so just packed the food in a bag and handed it over as Cutter handed him the exact change.

They stared at each other for a beat and then Cutter walked out.

Stephen called out that he was going on a break, then locked himself in the toilets and cursed his own stupid refection.

* * * * *

Abby and Connor came next. They'd ordered food from one of his colleagues before he'd even realised they were there. They were laughing and joking and touching a lot and Stephen realised this was a snapshot of all the things he'd missed. He couldn't bring himself to stop looking at them but he couldn't bring himself to go and talk to them either. They left with a wave that could have been meant for anyone but Stephen hoped it had been meant for him.

* * * * *

The final visit came from Lester and Jenny. Stephen wasn't even sure if Lester had ever bought his own coffee before, but here he was ordering a latte and a flat white for himself and Jenny.

“You've looked worse,” Lester told him and Stephen snorted softly to himself as he made their drinks.

“Don't you have a secretary for this sort of thing?”

“Executive assistants,” he replied, “do not fetch the coffee.” Lester leaned forward. “They also don't try to talk sense into recalcitrant employees.”

“I quit,” Stephen said. “Pretty sure that doesn't make me your employee.” He handed over the coffees. “Or your responsibility.”

Lester shrugged. “We'll see.”

Before Stephen could say anything else Lester and Jenny were walking away, coffees in hand. He watched them disappear into a car that had been idling at the kerb and wondered if this was some kind of bizarre threat or a genuine offer of help.

He rubbed a hand across his face. He realised that if he even had to ask the question it was probably time to read all the emails Lester had sent him over the past nine months instead of sending them straight to his spam folder.

* * * * *

Lester had asked him to come back. More than once.

He couldn't quite believe it. There was talk of the team needing him. Of the team missing him. Of Lester not wanting to get anyone else to sign the Official Secrets Act if he had any choice in the matter.

And then there was the talk of Cutter falling to pieces, though that started to fade and Cutter seemed to be functioning again especially after Helen's arrest.

That last part gave Stephen pause. He hadn't heard about Helen being back or under armed guard, though he supposed there was really no reason why he should. It wasn't the sort of thing Jenny was going to let be paraded on the nightly evening news.

Helen.

He'd done a very good job of not thinking about her in these last few months, especially when she was the reason he was in this mess in the first place. Him and his damn libido.

It would be easy to say that he'd succumbed to the one Cutter that had been willing to have him, but that would have done both Nick and himself a disservice.

He'd wanted to feel Helen come apart for him. The fact that he'd been the one doing the coming apart was neither here nor there.

Probably.

* * * * *

Stephen took a couple of days to think about it before taking his old phone out of its hiding place at the back of a tin of beans in his kitchen cupboard and opening up the contacts. Cutter was still listed under his most recent number and he found himself hesitating again as his finger brushed against his name.

This was a bad idea. But then when had that ever stopped him?

Cutter answered on the second ring and before he had a chance to change his mind Stephen was asking if they could meet.

“I'd like that,” Cutter replied, sounding as if he meant it and then in the background there was shouting and alarms ringing and Stephen had to let him go without making any definite plans.

* * * * *

Six days after the phone call, after Stephen had seen on the news reports of mysterious lights in the Lake District and surreptitiously checked in with Lester that all the team had come back in one piece, he found himself sitting across an empty seat at an Italian restaurant round the corner from his work.

Cutter wasn't late, Stephen was just exceptionally early and nervously picking at the bowl of bread in front of him, tearing it into little crumbs and then hiding them under the bread rolls with a flick of his wrist.

“That's no way to treat decent food,” Cutter said and Stephen almost jumped out of his skin.

“Nick – Cutter – you're here...”

Cutter looked amused and sat himself down. “Jenny gave me a lift.”

“It's – it's good to see you,” Stephen said.

“Perhaps we should start by getting the apology out of the way.”

“Of course,” Stephen said. He'd rehearsed this so often in his head that he was afraid that it would sound insincere, but he meant every word of what he was about to say.

“So I'd like to say I'm sorry,” Cutter said.

Stephen blinked. “You what?”

“I should have given you the opportunity to explain – I certainly shouldn't have called you a coward, that was uncalled for. I just – I lost my temper and I threw away our friendship without a second thought. It was - “

“Hang on, you want to apologise to _me_?”

“Of course, that's why I wanted to see you.”

Cutter's expression started to look as confused as Stephen's.

“Right,” Stephen said after a moment. The waiter interrupted by putting down a jug of water and Stephen gratefully took a moment to settle his nerves and poured out glasses for himself and Cutter.

“Did you think I'd agreed to see you here for some sort of ultimatum? _Stephen_ , I came here to ask you to come back.”

“Come back?” Stephen asked.

“We've all missed you,” Cutter said, “even Lester. He said he'd been emailing?”

“I'd sort of been ignoring them,” Stephen admitted sheepishly. He didn't dare focus on the fact that Cutter had been missing him.

“And I thought I was supposed to be the irresponsible one,” Cutter said.

Stephen tried to smile but found his mouth wasn't quite working the way he wanted it to.

“Stephen...I – I want...Why is this so hard?”

Stephen bit his bottom lip to stop from saying anything that might ruin the moment.

“I missed you,” Cutter said eventually. He moved his hand forward over the table as if to take Stephen's and then seemed to think better of it and reached for some bread instead. “I missed you more than I thought I would and I wasn't angry for the reasons I thought I was either.”

He looked down at the table and then taking a deep breath looked at Stephen to see how this news was being received.

Stephen looked a little shell-shocked. He'd loved Helen, of course, with a fierce passion that had boiled up in him and then left nothing but the faint traces of steam; it had taken longer with Cutter for his feelings to manifest themselves as something deeper than friendship but he'd never once considered the idea that Cutter might feel anything like the way he did.

“I missed you too,” he said, quietly.

Cutter nodded, satisfied, and then began to pore over the menu. Stephen watched him for a few moments and then began to do the same.

“You'll be coming back, then?” Cutter asked, once food and wine had been selected.

“I'd like that,” Stephen replied.

Cutter gave one of his infectiously bright smiles and Stephen let himself breath. It wasn't a declaration, on either of their parts, but it was a start. He wasn't quite sure if he deserved it, but he was going to do his best to live up to the second chance he'd been given and to the promises they weren't quite ready to make.


End file.
